Two activists disrupted the Amazon Web Services summit in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday to protest Project Nimbus, Amazon and Google $1.2 billion cloud computing contract with the Israeli government.
The first activist, who appeared to be a teenage man in a video shared with WIRED, stood on a chair, waved a Palestinian flag, and demanded an end to Project Nimbus.
“Dave Levy, why is Amazon contracting for a government that every mainstream human rights organization says is an apartheid state?” – he shouted. “Why does Amazon provide cloud services to a government that is committing genocide and the crime of apartheid?”
The man was immediately escorted by security and two officers from the Warsaw Police Headquarters. Shortly thereafter, a second activist, who appeared to be a teenage woman in the video shared with WIRED, stood on a chair and waved a banner reading “LONG GAZA LIVE.”
“Forty thousand dead, Dave Levy!” she screamed. “You have blood on your hands thanks to technology that enables the mass slaughter of Palestinians! You may develop technology for good, but your technology fuels genocide! How do you feel knowing that genocide is taking place on Amazon?”
This activist was also immediately escorted by security.
HRW AND Amnesty International both declared that Israel was committing the crime of apartheid. Since Israel launched its military campaign in Gaza last fall, over 39,000 PalestiniansAccording to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, including more than 15,000 children. Israel’s military campaign follows an October 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel that killed more than 1,100 Israelis.
Israel is currently accused of genocide in the International Court of Justice in the case brought by the Republic of South Africa. In May International Criminal Court filed arrest warrants alleging war crimes against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar and two other Hamas officials. Israel has repeatedly denied accusations of genocide and other crimes.
Both activists represented the No Tech for Apartheid coalition formed in 2021 to protest against Project Nimbus. The group consists of tech workers and organizers, the Muslim grassroots group MPower Change and the anti-Zionist Jewish group Jewish Voices for Peace.
In a statement released by No Tech for Apartheid after the protest, the group said that while it has been protesting Project Nimbus since 2021, Google and Amazon to continue the deal “in the midst of this genocide reach a new level of horror.” “
“We are here to interrupt normal operations until contacts are severed,” the statement reads.
Amazon did not immediately respond to WIRED’s request for comment.
No apartheid technology has sparked several major protests in recent months. In March, a member of the group and then a Google Cloud engineer Eddie Hatfield interrupted the CEO of Google Israel at Mind the Tech – a conference sponsored by Google dedicated to the Israeli technology industry. Hatfield he was released a few days later.
In April, Google employees and a group staged a sit-in at the company’s offices in New York and Sunnyvale, California, with simultaneous protests taking place outside. In response, the police detained nine employees over 50 employees they were laid off in two waves of layoffs. Some dismissed employees filed a complaint about unfair labor practices with a response from the National Labor Relations Board, and the case is ongoing.
In recent weeks, as part of another No Tech for Apartheid campaign, over 1,100 students from over 120 universities signed a declaration in which they pledged not to take up jobs or internships at Google and Amazon until they resign from Project Nimbus.